Fitness at Root of VCU's 'Havoc'

Virginia Commonwealth, a David slinging at a world of Goliaths, was a nobody in college basketball until a few years ago.

But here is one reason why VCU now beats the sport's big boys: The way the Rams train makes other elite athletes look like schlubs on the recumbent bike.

In preparation for the still-nascent college-basketball season, VCU endured an off-season workout regimen that was as exhausting as it was extreme. The players turned tires, tossed kegs and used a parking deck near their home court as a treadmill. They lugged 60-pound bags not far from the site where Patrick Henry demanded either liberty or death.

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